AI regulation won’t really impact the telecom industry—for now

The “One Big Beautiful Bill” is officially legal without a proposed 10-year ban on states regulating AI. While more AI laws may be on the horizon, experts think that probably won’t impact telecommunications companies using AI—at least not yet. The idea behind AI regulation is to ensure the AI (specifically, agentic AI) doesn’t do anything harmful, said J.Gold Associates Founder Jack Gold, “like the reports of LLMs and GenAI systems trying to threaten their operators if they think they are being shut down.” Telephone companies, who are still figuring out how to monetize and effectively use AI, simply provide the network platform AI applications ride on. “So, any regulations would fall on the companies deploying the AI,” Gold explained.